


The Ancillarium: Being a Compendium of Side Stories to the Saga of the Coin, the Sword and the Medallion

by LooNEY_DAC



Category: Original Work
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:40:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LooNEY_DAC/pseuds/LooNEY_DAC
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	1. Index

Chapters will be linked here as they are added.

The Alamsta Triplet:  
[Alamsta Dreaming](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/58647724)

The Newer Prompt Set:  
[Awakening](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/58647853)

The Older Prompt Set:  
[Introduction](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/58647547)  
[Love](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/58647592)  
[Light](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/73226565)  
[Dark](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325177/chapters/73226880)


	2. Alamsta Dreaming

It had always amazed the Sleeping Princess that people spoke so casually of dreams, as though they could only ever be positive and hopeful and happy, when everyone knew that dreams inevitably included the darkest of nightmares as well.

So far, she had been most fortunate: she had been sleeping without dreaming for a hundred years and more; but now a dream was come to slay her peace, and she knew it was not to be one like those that the people she knew spoke of so casually.

_She was playing with her sisters, when a voice behind her jeered, “Lo, see the Undesired One!”_

_Her sisters vanished, and when she turned, she beheld the Magician, bearing the Witching Ring. On an altar before him was a bunny bound and ready to be sacrificed. She caught its eye as it struggled against the bonds that held it, and in that moment she knew that it was he._

_She tried to run up to the altar, but found that she couldn’t move any more than he could. The Magician laughed, taunting her in her helplessness. He brandished the Witching Ring and said, “You gave up your agency when you refused this, and so I triumph!”_

_Before the Magician could bring the knife down, though, the Bunny had somehow managed to free itself, standing up to face the Magician down in a contest that should have been ridiculous, but was horribly intense instead. A flash of light burst from the Bunny, blinding her..._

As the dream subsided, her thoughts turned to him, the reigning star of far too many of her dreams.

It was absurd; so she had told herself over and over again during the seemingly endless stretches between his appearances. If he felt anything for her at all beyond annoyance and disgust, it would most likely be pity for the Undesired One, and that was nearly harder to bear than the loss of her sisters.

Moreover, they had spent precious little time together, so it was absurd in that manner as well: she, the Princess famed for her waspish stand-offishness, should be the last person in the Realm to succumb to the folly of l-- _infatuation_ at sight.

But was it really at sight, though? Certainly, her first glimpse of him hadn’t been particularly conducive to these unwelcome affections towards him, as no one looked good when fleeing an enraged ram. 

Just as certainly, though, when she’d first met his eyes and seen his “Oh, it’s you, then” expression, something inside her had cracked. Even then, without knowing who he was or whence he came, she’d known that the thing she wanted most in the world was this bedraggled boy’s good opinion. Contrary as she was, the knowledge had only spurred her normal sarcastic wit to new heights. 

Once she knew who and what he was, though, her secret folly was even more absurd, as he would only come when they needed him most and vanish once his task was done, his visits as ephemeral as her dreams. She could never hold him to her as she wished; nor would she, as caging a flickering spark was the surest route to an inferno. 

She had told herself so many times that it was pure folly, and yet, each and every time he was nearby, his very nearness made her feel more alive, as though the long, drab stretches without him were so many dreams that his vivid reality set to flight, commanding her into wakefulness at last. 

Again and again during the long emptiness of his absence, she’d told herself that she must be strong, but all it took was his appearing to kindle in her the urge to run to him. This inevitable weakness in her mocked her claims of strength. 

Through the haze of her enforced slumber, she sensed someone’s approach, but without concern, as she knew that only the Young Protector could open her gilded-and-glazed cage and end her long sleep. He would come soon, bringing the joy and the pain of his presence, and she would soak up his nearness like a sponge against the long stretch of his next absence, as she always did when she was in his presence. It would be enough. 

_It would be soon..._


	3. Awakening

In the upper decks of the High Tower of the Castle of Magnatharast, often referred to as “the jewel of the Realm”, Reveille brought with it the inevitable faint echoes of various sleepy obscenities and other such objections from the lower decks of the Tower via the network of pipes carrying the announcement of the day’s beginning to all hands; while Alamsta, daughter of Alamanast XII of the Realm and Heiress Apparent to the Throne of Magnatharast, took a certain solace in knowing she was by no means alone in her loathing of early rising, she still rather wished that every morning didn’t have to begin this way.

On the other hand, the Heiress Apparent thought as she went through the mindless motions of her morning routine, it could be worse. Most of her punishments had her doing hard labor or repetitive tasks even more mindless than what she was doing right now, but there had been a very few times when she’d had to stand watch throughout a night that had seemed endless.

That basic level of reflection was all Alamsta was capable of at this hour, more or less: her faculties, both mental and physical, would take several hours yet and probably a meal or two as well to fully awaken. Fortunately, the Heiress Apparent was given a tad bit more leeway on these matters by the skipper and his various mates than the next-to-last daughter, though the rest of the job was even more brutal than Alamsta had suspected from the few things Thetherimsta had occasionally let slip.

Alamsta paused for a moment to let the grief thinking of her sisters always brought pass. The next-to-last daughter was what Alamsta had been before the death of all six of her sisters in a brief but deadly outbreak of the Coughing Death while Alamsta had been away on her Ordeal, and that memory was never without pain. It was worst in the mornings; by rights, Thetherimsta the Eldest should be doing this while Alamsta and the other five sent a fond jibe or two her way, and sometimes Reveille woke Alamsta from a happy dream where just that was going on.

This was reality, though, and Alamsta had to wash away such dreams with all the other remnants of sleep and get to her duties, for there was none other who could attend to them.

One of the cabin girls was waiting for Alamsta out in the Dressing Room, which meant that the King of the Realm desired that the Heiress Apparent attend him at her earliest “convenience”. Sometimes the thought flitted across her mind that her father was punishing her for having survived when none of her sisters had, but she always immediately batted it away: the thought was unworthy of the man she knew him to be. No, he was simply trying to ensure that she would always be ready to attend to the duties incumbent upon the Queen of the Realm, duties she would have to assume once he was no longer around.

Another reason that Alamsta disliked Morning Audiences was that this was the hour when her father looked his very worst, so much so that she couldn’t pretend that her ascension to the throne was still years away instead of days or weeks at most.

Even the brisk walk to the Grand Solar where the doctors wanted her father to take in the sunlight whenever possible (just as though he were some vegetable and not a man, she snorted to herself) failed to bring Alamsta fully awake, which was why her father’s appearance was even worse of a shock to her than usual. It was as though she had been trapped in a terrible nightmare from which there could be no awakening.

Somehow, Alamsta managed all the proper niceties of initiating a formal audience with the King while only barely registering his similarly rote responses. It was then that he made a pronouncement that finally brought her fully awake.

“It is time, my dear daughter, for you to journey to that Other World, find the Young Protector, and bring him back to the Realm.”


	4. Introduction

It is good to be a princess, a daughter of the King. So Alamsta reminded herself every day, even when she was being punished by having to herd the sheep. After all, for those for whom she was substituting, herding the sheep was not punishment but their way of earning their keep, and many in the Realm had even worse jobs.

In the Castle of the Kings of the Realm, there was a hall known as the Hall of the Holdings; along its walls hung the flags and crests of every fief in the Realm, and at its end hung a beautifully detailed tapestry mapping the Realm Proper in its entirety. If one were to pull that tapestry aside, one would find a hidden door that opened onto the Royal Dais in the King’s Audience Chamber; only royalty were permitted to pass through this door. Every King and Queen of the Realm walked down the Hall of Holdings and gazed full upon the Realm Proper before going to meet their subjects.

Of course, however beautiful it was, a tapestry was merely a tapestry. It only meant something to those who had seen what it signified. Thus, every Heir Apparent underwent The Wandering, and every King and Queen had to make The Great Rounds. Such was the way of the Realm.

Before she was left as the Heir Apparent, Alamsta knew this in a detached and academic way; now, she was faced with the prospect of her own Wandering.

Oh, dear.


	5. Love

It was nothing like the poetry she’d read as a child, before it had come upon her.

There was no lightning, no blare of trumpets or quaking of the earth when it happened. There were no fireworks, no giddy raptures nor even a jump of her heart. Nothing about it was like anything she’d ever read, been told or overheard by chance.

There was just the knowledge that this one person meant more to her than any other, and always would. Whether or not he returned the feeling made no difference; whether or not he knew of her feelings made no difference; whether or not he was even present made no difference. It was just that way, and always would be.

It was that way even though she would much rather it were some other way—any other way, really. Were it some other way, she could fulfill her duty to her father, her line, and her country, to say nothing of the relief it would give her personally. Sometimes she wept at night, wishing it were not so, but it was, nonetheless. It was, and always would be.

It was that way, will she or nil she, and so her tears were few and far between. She was the Princess Royal, and whether it was that way or not, she was supposed to be the mistress of her emotions, and so she would not be mastered by them.

Of course, love was not an emotion. It was a promise.


	6. Light

She was sure her feet weren’t touching the ground.

Alamsta almost giggled at the thought. Of course her feet weren’t touching the ground; she was riding on a gently swaying wagon. Even so, the absolute joy flowing through her made her feel as though the reality all around her was not—could not truly be—reality at all, and it was all due to him.

She knew she was being inexcusably obvious about it, but she didn’t care (not that she could have done anything about it if she had cared). All she could do was go on staring at him, her heart in her eyes for all to see.

Everything about the world she lived in; all the things that nagged at her and irked her into her sarcastic outbursts; all of it was utterly silent now, and her world was at peace at long last. Nothing could bother her now; she wouldn’t let anything bother her, and no one had ever accused her of having too little willfulness.

The heavy load of her cares and woes and responsibilities had sloughed off of her like a thick layer of tar, leaving her lighter than air.

Dawn was breaking, and he was singing with joy, and that was all that mattered. While the night would certainly come again, it was over now, and as the landscape all about her lightened, so did her heart. Her heart full, she watched his fuzzy form as they were borne along on the wagon.


	7. Dark

They were dead.

They were all dead, all seven of them, and nothing would ever be the same again for the one who lived.

Just the thought of their absence—never laughing with them, annoying them, smiling at them, frowning at them, loving them and hating them ever again—was like a great, thick blanket of anguish that sucked all the joy out of the days to come.

Had this been why her father had refused to wed again, though his late wife had only ever borne him daughters?

Alone though she was, the survivor felt a bit foolish about actually doing what she’d come here to do, and had felt she must do; this did not prevent her from doing it. After taking one long breath, she listed off their names and epithets:

“Thetherimsta the Eldest, Matrenimsta the Fairest, Hietheromsta the Wisest, Palamsta the Kindest, Hieromsta the Smartest, and Narimsta the Youngest, Daughters of Alamanast King of the Realm (Twelfth of That Name), of the Line of Magnatharast.”

All of them were dead now, and the survivor, the one who had survived solely by a whim of fate, would now have to face a life where they were gone for good.

“And now, just over a century later, the story of the Last Heir Standing plays itself out again: I am Alamsta the Undesired, the Death of my Mother and the Last Heir to Alamanast.” The survivor straightened. “But that Line shall go on.”

It was a solemn vow.


End file.
